Ok, here is a topic for only nonaggressive people and those that are openminded. I myself have done my reaserch and have heard many opinions on this subject. So here goes. When it comes to the art of Hap Ki Do, the name who do you feel created it. Gm Ji Han Jae or Gm Choi. I know Choi claims to only have taugh Yawra, and nothing else, and many say that Ji coined the name and the art of HKD and gave them to Choi (the name at least). What do you all think? My thoughts. Though Grandmaster Choi, god bless his soul, was the man who inspired HKD, it seems to me through my reaserch that what we know of as HKD by technique and attitude, today is the art that was created and developed in large part by Grandmaster Ji Han Jae (by the way which one is his last name, Ji or Jae?, I always just call him Grandmaster.) I know a lot of people say Choi and give him all the credit, but at the same time he claims to have taught only Yawra, and getting a straight answer out of my GM about some of these questions is impossible. I almost think that with as seceretive as the older Korean culture is, this mass confusion may be another way of keeping everybody in the dark.
Hi Hapkid0ist GM Fred Adams tells a story of GM Choi training in a flour mill. As he was very poor he was trading techniques with the mill owner for grain to feed his pigs. After a while the mill owner set aside a room specifically for this purpose and they would refer to it as the Hap Ki Dojang. The mill owner asked what the art was called and GM Choi replied that he did not have a name for it. So they thought that as they were training in the Hapkidojang that is what it would be called which eventually became shortened to HapKiDo. (Obviously I have given a very brief description of the tale) I personally have not done a great deal of research in this, but it is rather a nice story. I have also been led to believe that Ji Han Jae was a student of GM Choi and that he wasn't his first student. Hope there are more informed people out there as I find these stories quite fascinating and would like to know more.
If one reads the interviews with Suh,Bok Sup,one will see many variations of the art Choi and Suh started and Suh makes many references to Hapkido and forms of the word/s including hapkido well before GM Ji Han Jae. I have also talked to GM Chin Il Chang,a Live in student of Choi,who told me similar stories and names of the Art as told by Suh and that Ji Han Jae did not come up with the name Hapkido. We today need to focus on what we do and the name it is called today,all the in fighting of what was taught,who claims to have added what, and the various names of the art over the last nearly 6 decades only causes more confusion,more in fighting and more seperation instead of unification. The Base Art is Daito Ryu Aiki Jujitsu as taught by Takeda to Choi,who in turn taught Suh and who together taught all those who claim Hapkido roots from Choi. Choi never claimed to not have a name for the Art as he always said what it was and he never altered that teaching. If Choi had not met Suh and together created the art, then non of these GMs who claimed to have created anything whould be teaching,as with out the Base Of Daito Ryu you have a Kicking art and I believe they called that Tae Kyun which became TKD.
